The Fall Hex Enduction Hour

Al Spicer(May 1998)

Most people, if they're lucky, have their lives changed, re-directed by a
record only once or twice in their lifetimes. It tends to happen a little
more regularly if, like me, you sold your soul to rock'n'roll at an early
age or if, like me, you've devoted a large part of your life (and presumably
your brain - just say 'No' kids!) to the pursuit and ingestion of various
government-prohibited pharmaceuticals. Sergeant Pepper did it for the
masses in the sixties; Hex Enduction Hour did it for me just over a decade
later.

Of course, if your life is to be changed by an album, the setting is
important. Sergeant Pepper was probably most memorably life-changing for
those few souls already deeply involved with psychedelia and all the
loon-panted tomfoolery that went along with it. Hex changed my life in the
most perfect of settings for speed-crazed, late-punk delirium; I first heard
it as a righteous maelstrom tearing its way out of the tinny speaker of my
pal's portable cassette player, distorted by low batteries and amplifier
overload in a badly-driven, rattly, oil-starved Ford Escort 7cwt van. My
hearing savagely twisted by little blue pills - I guess holding my head out
of the window to shout abuse at the sheep we were passing didn't aid my
appreciation of the album's subtlety and delicate chiaroscuro much either-
I was unable at first to distinguish any of the words...it didn't seem to
matter much, the guy doing the singing was holding a grudge and everyone was
invited.

It was the perfect mood to accompany the gathering socio-political gloom
(it's been an ambition of mine to include the phrase 'socio-political' in a
piece of my writing for some time... another one to cross off my list)
brought on by economic decline and the terrifying jurassic dawn of
Thatcherism. It was angry, arrogant, swaggering at times yet beset by doubt
and paranoia at others. The music hinted at drug use and was filled with
snatches of language, images really, that formed a strange and difficult
narrative.

The album opened up with a full-on broadside, the swaggering, drum-laden
track "The Classical" - a laying-out of all the goods they had to sell me.
With time and repeated listenings (I drove my flatmates mad) I got to pick
up and inspect every little gem on the counter. "Jawbone and the Air-rifle,"
the 2nd track, is one of Mark Smith's gorgeous little short stories from
hell - anything that includes a couplet like "Gravekeeper says 'You're out
of luck, here is a jawbone caked in muck'" merits detailed investigation but
it was the 3rd track, "Hip Priest," that had me on me knees, praying in the
direction of Manchester.

You see, by the time the album was released, in Smith's own words, "the
conventional was now experimental" and the band was no-longer beating its
own path through the underground undergrowth - the Fall were being stalked
by a new generation of jumped-up chancers desperate to scramble onto their
bandwagon. Smith's contempt and amusement at being hailed as a leader was
compelling and vital stuff. The rest of the British media scene came under
withering fire from Smith's crisp hatred in "Deer Park" and "Mere Pseud Mag.
Ed" and there was even a drop of political venom in "Who makes the Nazis?"

"And this Day" is an epic 'chucking-out song' for indie clubs around the
world and both "Iceland" and "Winter" are strong enough to send shivers down
the spine but that's nothing unusual for the Fall.

This is far too rich an album to be taken in one sitting, and like the
finest wine, it's best sipped rather than gulped. There's a lot of stuff to
listen to here and you'd better be taking notes 'cos I'll be asking
questions later. Now get out of here and study!